How does one convey devastation? The feeling within from watching one's parents die, in a blaze as far from glory as it was closer to horror.

  We stood there on that bluff -- the Master, my Hunter-half, and me. The Master's face was cleaved from stone, jaws firmly but not tightly clenched, his dark eyes hardened chips of obsidian, reflecting the light of the many fires below. Lily's young face had more animation -- hate, pain, anger -- her little fists clenched so tight her knuckles were bloodless.

  But me, I felt nothing.

  Maybe it was like being a reverse amputee. Instead of trying to explain the feeling one gets from a limb that had been lost, it was like never feeling it was there at all. I should feel the loss of my parents, but there was nothing. I never really knew them.

  I was raised to be a Hunter. Raised by the community to be loyal to the Council. I had seen my parents about as often as they had seen each other. Even then, they were just people my carers and instructors would point out to me, those cold heroes who ventured out into the Wild to protect non-Hunters, recover technology and destroy the undying. Every now and then I would feel something that must be pride -- a pleasant swelled feeling -- that I was of their line. That was a rare feeling over the breadth of my thirteen years, however, as I was usually too busy training to be a Hunter, especially after I was selected to be one of the Master's only two apprentices.

  Today though, there was nothing. Only the acrid smell of burning decayed flesh in the hot wind from the white-edged black fires below filled my mind.

  ``Come, we must go,'' the Master murmured grimly, turning away from the inferno.

  ``There are still survivors!'' Lily exclaimed hotly.

  She was right. The field below was still alive with movement. Several groups of Hunters had formed, each encircled by a growing shambling, crawling, floating, gliding, twitching mass. A light caught our attention from one of the smaller groups -- a sacrifice, one of the Hunters giving up their soul essence to become a moving undead bomb, ploughing their way into the crowd of undying.

  Several other brilliant lights flared and extinguished as other Hunters, their group pressured, saw the futility of fighting free let alone untouched by the undead plague and gave their life up to destroy as many undead as they could. If I didn't understand it fully before, I understood it more than ever now -- what it means to be a Hunter.

  ``This is not a victory,'' I murmured to myself.

  ``No. It is a necessity.''

  I started when the Master responded for I didn't think he had heard my soft whisper. I stared at him, this man, this legend, the greatest Hunter to ever achieve the title `Master', giving up his own name and identity to the title. He was the only Hunter allowed to travel on his own, where others travelled in pairs or threes -- this was so if one Hunter succumbed, the other would do the merciful thing and destroy them before they turned. It was also to keep Hunters from temptation. The temptation to lie to oneself and convince oneself that one was not infected was always there. It had happened before in the past, apparently. A Hunter had come home . . . and eaten its way through several families before it was discovered. Before it was destroyed like the thing it had become. No longer a person. No longer living.

  ``Today we have culled their ranks. They will not amass such a gathering for some time. If the Council's estimation is correct, three more Cullings over the next decade will allow us to return to return to this portion of the mainland,'' the Master spoke just as another flare, brighter than all previous, someone who had great life, lit his face, showing the great sadness in his eyes as he stared at the field below.

  ``We should still help them.'' The fight had left Lily's voice however. She knew too that it was over. Her fists remained clenched tight as she watched the lights with glowing eyes of hatred, but this time, she let the Master turn her away, her little shoulders bowing. Any survivors would find their way home to Karta like only Hunters could -- leaving a trail of destroyed undead in their wake and surviving. That was also what it meant to be a Hunter.

  Within the hour, Lily was skipping happily along beside us. She skilfully avoided the cracks in the dry and dusty red earth, picking off undead, as were the Master and I, that had come late to the Culling. I marvelled that perhaps this was also what it meant to be a Hunter -- the ability to set aside the memories of the horrors in the past.

  ``Where are we going?'' she finally asked the Master when there were no longer any undying to divert her attention.

  ``Where do you think?'' he redirected the query back to both of us.

  ``To Loong Han,'' I murmured, or at least that was what my internal map told me -- the only settlement we could reach before nightfall in this direction.

  To my satisfaction, the Master nodded. A Hunter must have an excellent sense of direction and geography.

  Lily grounded to a halt. ``What?! Why aren't we going back to Karta?'' she demanded.

  Following the Master's lead, I continued walking, forcing Lily to hurry to keep up.

  ``The Council has received word that a trader there has some information that would be of great interest to us.''

  We reached Loong Han as the sun was setting. Lily and I had never been, as the Culling was the first time the Master had taken us out of Karta for longer than a day. It seemed that the Master was well known here though, for as we walked up the steep hill to the colony, the gatekeeper greeted him with a friendly wave before opening the heavy, spiked metal gates of the colony. The other gatekeeper, armed with a flame-thrower, faced the colony interior and let out a loud whoop. As we entered the colony, we were suddenly surrounded by people, mostly women and children, trying to show us their wares for trade.

  What little I knew about Loong Han was that it was a trader colony. They had left Karta almost four years ago and had quickly become information and small technology brokers. Their roaming traders were trained like Hunters and went far afield from the colony to seek information or goods that others would be interested in trading for, particularly the Hunter Council back at Karta. They were one of the success stories told and taught at Karta.

  The Master politely ignored the clamouring traders, weaving through the crowd with expertise, while Lily and I were buffeted with claims of the worth of goods and services. Eventually, we pushed through to find the Master conversing with a middle-aged Mongoloid with long wispy whiskers, sitting in the shade of a small cafe. The Master was already sipping carefully from a small steaming cup as he listened to the trader.

  I was stopped short when someone caught my arm as Lily hurried away. I turned in annoyance to find another even older and wispier whiskered trader, his whiskers reaching almost to his waist, bowing at me even as he held me by my arm.

  ``Please, I have very valuable technology. Technology Hunters want, yes?'' he insisted in his slightly affected accent as he bowed.

  ``Let go of my arm, I must join my companions,'' I tried to tell him, but he bowed some more and pressed something into the hand of the arm he grasped.

  ``If you find valuable, come trade. Ask anyone for Ting house. If not, come return. I trust Hunter honesty.''

  And then he was gone, hobbling quickly away, leaving me stunned in his wake. I looked down at my hand and found I now held a small metal tablet of some sort, with a dark but shiny screen, like the machines of old but much flatter and smaller.

  The Master calling me caught my attention and I quickly stuffed the tablet in my rucksack with a mental reminder to find the old man called Ting and return his unwanted tablet. I hurried to the Master's side just in time to catch the last words of the conversation about something called a ``container ship'' roaming about the coast. The Master nodded his thanks to the trader and dropped a small leather pouch that clinked softly on the cafe's basic metal table. He also left one of what was in the small pouch on the table for the cafe proprietress before ushering Lily and I away -- a small metallic cylinder with a bump on one end, a power-cell known as a battery.

  As we walked towards a dwelling colourfully painted in vivid greens and blues -- a stark contrast to the reds and browns of the earth and dull greens and yellows of the vegetation -- decrying it as a place travellers could rest, the Master explained that we would rest and pick up some specific supplies then move on towards the coast in the morning. A trader had encountered a unique ship that roamed up and down the western coast non-stop. On board the ship, a colony had settled and survived, if not thrived. What was important about the ship was that it once transported, among other things, technology.

  Karta, despite possessing the most modern fortress in history to stave off the undead hordes, or perhaps because of its modernness, needed technology. The force-light walls that formed the fortress eventually wore out and lost their light. The light that kept the undead at bay was well maintained and deeply studied by the Technologists, who had been able to extend the life of the power-cells that kept the walls lit a little every year, but every year at least one power-cell was extinguished forever. There were stores of course, extra power-cells used only specifically to power the walls that had been sought out, sometimes with great losses, by the Hunters.

  The force-light walls were not only used on Karta, but sometimes a wealthy or influential colony will leave the overpopulated Karta to make their way into the Wild and try to eke out a living, trying to reclaim the land from the undying. They would take some force-light walls with them to give their colony the best possible chance of beginning. Most colonies did not, relying only on the Hunters sent to escort them to their destination, for the price of a large percentage of the goods the colonies find or grow.

  Technology found wasn't always related to the mysterious force-light that the Technologists had still not found a way to replicate. Sometimes they produced weapons, better ways of fighting the undead with less loss of Hunters. Sometimes it was better agricultural tools. Mostly, however, it was useless junk. The hope was always there though, in every living being, the hope of finding that one piece of technology to rid the world of the undead forever. It was what drove every Hunter to roam out into the Wilds, with almost certain loss of life, not today perhaps, not tomorrow, but any future day. No active Hunter had ever survived beyond their sixtieth birthday.

  Lily could not contain her excitement now, on learning that we could possibly bring back to Karta heretofore unknown technology. The Master had to curb her high pitched queries with a stern shake of his head. We went inside the colourful building and the Master silently indicated we would stay one night in one room on the hostel's proprietor's queries with one finger lifted to every question. The proprietor gave us an old fashioned key and pointed us to the stairs, calling out that the room was on the first left as we walked away.

  Once we were alone inside the room, which had no beds of course, we threw our packs on the floor. The Master promptly left telling us he needed to pick up the special supplies, so we unrolled our sleeping mats as well as his. As I pulled my sleeping mat off my rucksack, the small metal tablet the old trader had pressed upon me fell out with a thud.

  ``What's that!'' Lily exclaimed, swooping down to grab the tablet. I was faster and scooped it up away from her reach.

  ``It's nothing. Something one of the traders drop\-ped. I have to find him and give it back to him later.''

  ``It looks like technology.'' Lily, a head shorter than me, stood on her tip-toes and tried to peer over my shoulder at the object as I turned away and stuffed it back in my rucksack. ``We should show the Master.''

  ``The Master saw it. I saw the old trader try to press it on him first. He rejected it.''

  ``What does it do?''

  I shrugged. If the Master was not interest, then it was worth nothing.

  ``Let me take a look at it,'' Lily insisted, but I shook my head.

  ``I can't return it if you break it.''

  ``Just let me look at it, I won't touch it!'' She tried to grab my rucksack so I picked it up and stood with a sigh.

  ``I'm returning it now. If the Master returns before me, tell him I've gone to return a trader's item.'' Before she could try again, I quickly exited the room. A brief query to the hostel proprietor, who luckily did not ask for anything in trade for the information, pointed me to a dank and small hut in the darkest corner and at the end of the dingiest alley of the colony. It looked like a place an undead could be hiding in. I stood before the barely attached door a little dubiously, then rapped on the side of the hut before I could lose my nerve.

  There was some voices from inside, then the poor door creaked open and the old trader peered out. He was frowning fiercely when he first looked out, but his face quickly smoothed into a pleasant smile when he recognised me.

  ``Ah, Master Hunter,'' he clucked, stepping outside.

  ``I am not a master, only an apprentice,'' I quickly corrected, in case the old trader thought he could sell me something more with the disillusion that I had anything to trade. I pulled out his tablet and stretched my arm forward. ``I've come to return your tablet. I have nothing to trade for it,'' I said in my most respectful tone.

  He waved his hands from side to side urgently at me and did not take the tablet. ``No, no, you keep! You have something to trade! You Hunter! Speak to son! Tell him Hunter is no good!'' The more flustered he became, the worse his accent was colouring his words. I took a patient breath and waited as he calmed down.

  ``You are Hunter, yes?'' he tried again, this time calmer.

  ``No. I am only an apprentice. I'm learning to be a Hunter.''

  He frowned slightly, but pressed on. ``Yes, so you know what it like to be a Hunter, yes?''

  ``I do,'' I admitted wryly. I was starting to get the feeling the old man would not allow any form of rejection to get in the way of whatever he was trying to get me to do. I started surreptitiously trying to figure out escape routes out of the little alley.

  ``Speak to my son. It is all I ask for the technology.''

  ``Why do you want me to speak to your son?''

  ``He wants to be Hunter. But he must be trader! Like me! He my only son!''

  I shook my head. ``If he wants to be a Hunter, then it is not for me to stop him.''

  ``Please!'' the old man begged as a voice called out from within the hut. He called back something urgent, but then someone else stepped out of the hut. It was a young woman. She looked in her early twenties. She was also very heavily pregnant.

  ``Pris,'' she murmured, tears in her eyes, her hands held over her bulging abdomen protectively. Suddenly, she dropped down to her knees and touched her head to my boots with much difficulty. I almost kicked out in surprise and instead stepped back, startled. ``Pris!''

  ``Please get up!'' I exclaimed, helping the old man, each of us with one arm, lift the woman to her feet. I was even more startled to realise that she was so little that I was already equal to her height at half her age.

  ``She is my son's wife,'' the old man said reproachfully to me. ``If he goes to Karta, he leave wife and baby. Son says he go to learn to protect wife and baby. But I am old. I cannot help her or baby. I cannot find goods and trade enough to feed everyone without son.''

  As I stood there, staring into the tiny woman's tear-streaked face, I wondered what it was like to know both your parents. I had seen families on Karta. Outside the force-light fortress walls lived an entire population of farmers, gatherers, traders, craftsmen and all sorts that helped clean up after, feed, clothe and teach future Hunters. They had families. The few times I had been allowed to wander outside the fortress walls, I had seen children and their parents interact, laughing, prancing, hopping, scolding. I would never have that. I think I had half-siblings, but if so they had never been introduced to me, just as I had never been introduced to my parents, and just like they probably never had been to their parents either. Lily had grown up in the Wilds with her parents and siblings, and very very rarely spoke about what it had been like, her tone always bittersweet.

  It sounded nice.

  I sighed. ``Where is your son?'' I asked, resigned.

  The old man punched his fist into the air in joy, prompting a question in another language from the young woman. He said something brief back to her, and she tried to kiss my boots again. We managed to stop her and picked her up again.

  ``Please tell her to stop doing that! I do not have the training to deliver a child!''

  The old man nodded and ushered her back inside, then turned back to me, his face smoothed into a calm smile again.

  ``Son back from trading soon. Come inside and wait.''

  ``Uh, that's ok, I'll wait out here.'' I was afraid the hut would fall on us all if all three of us were to exhale a breath all at once. ``Just remember, I can't promise I will be successful in dissuading him.''

  The old man nodded at my words, seeming to be confident that I would succeed, and waited outside with me. As the shadows began to disappear into night, we finally heard someone trudging down the alley. A young man stepped into view, carrying a rod across his shoulders with a basket suspended on each end. When he saw me, he stopped warily and threw a question to the old man in their strange lyrical language. The old man replied, ``This is a Hunter. Listen to Hunter. See if you still want to be Hunter.''

  The young man jutted out his chin. ``I become Hunter! Protect wife! Protect baby!'' He then pointed fiercely at the old man. ``Protect father!''

  ``How old are you?'' I cut in as father and son began a ferocious glaring contest. The young man was startled. He couldn't be much older than the young woman. ``It doesn't matter. I'm thirteen. I have been training to be a Hunter since I was born. But I am still not a Hunter. Nor will I be one for at least another five years. Even if you go to Karta this instant, how long will it take before you become a Hunter?''

  The young man shook his head and placed his baskets on the ground. He curled one hand into a fist then pointed with the thumb at his chest. ``I am strong! I am smart! Quick learner! And I have killed undead before!''

  ``Then you're already a hunter,'' I pointed out, ``just not an official one.''

  ``I want to be official! Hunters get everything! Cheaper trades! Better goods! I don't want to be trader forever!''

  ``Think this through,'' I replied. ``We're talking about eighteen years. Even if you were to become an apprentice immediately, even if you were the most brilliant apprentice there has ever been, the Council will still not approve you until you have spent at least five years as an apprentice. By then, what would have happened to the wife and baby and father that you wanted to protect?''

  ``I will not live that long!'' the old man exclaimed as an emphasis.

  ``I send money home!'' he insisted.

  ``What money?'' I said in surprise. ``I think you misunderstand! You don't get anything, not a thing, until you become a full fledged Hunter. Even then, anything you find, everything you have, belongs to the Council. {\it You} belong to the Council. For your training, you will never want for anything, but you don't own anything either.''

  The young man deflated. ``Nothing?'' he asked, stunned, rocking back on his heels.

  ``Nothing.''

  I left them then, the lost looking young man and his father, who patted him on the shoulder. That was the last I saw of them. When I found my way back to the hostel, I finally remembered that I still had the tablet. Cursing silently, I promised to myself I would return it first thing in the morning. I did not want to find my way back to the hut in the dark.

  The Master did not comment on my absence. Instead, he quietly briefed Lily and I on what the plan would be for the next two days. As I fell asleep that night, I realised that not only would we be away from Karta for more than a day, it seemed we would be away for several more days. Luckily, the excitement of that thought did not prevent my exhausted and dreamless sleep.

  %======================================================================================================================

  \hr

  ``\mychptstart{What} is it?'' Lily murmured, staring wide eyed over the sand dune at the metal rectangular object below.

  I recognised a container when I saw one though. It was described by many of our teachers as sour\-ces of lost technology. If Lily paid attention during classes, she would probably have recognised it too, but she thought little of the classes given to the learning Hunters. Lessons which also included how to identify and finally put down -- for the dead cannot be exterminated, eradicated or even killed again -- the undead things.

  Lily herself was still considered to be a learning Hunter, for she had come from the outside instead of being born in our great Hunter fortress on Karta. Lily had not wanted to stay in classes learning how to identify lost technology and how to destroy the things. She had run away, stowed away on the boats departing Karta, following other Hunters. She had to be brought back each time, each time stubbornly announcing that she would do it again. Many had tried to explain to her the danger she presented, not only to herself but the Hunters she tagged stealthily behind.

  Eventually, they had paired her off with me, two years her senior, and we had been hand-picked to become the Master's first apprentices, one of the few young ones allowed to leave Karta at our tender age. I think they felt I would be a stabilising influence on her.

  I felt I had made little if any impact. I was fine with that, considering. She had watched her family die -- her mother, drained of her humanity by other things, eating her father as he screamed and tried to fight her off, this after making a meal of her elder sister; her little brother, alive, but barely, left a mindless, drooling, walking, haunted survivor by his former mother's vicious hunger, rocking back and forth in the Healing Halls -- and now she wanted only one thing: to destroy ALL the things.

  Still, I attempted to impart upon her the power of information. ``It's a container. The teachers teach us that it might contain valuable technology.''

  The Master nodded, then shifted carefully but quickly down to a closer sand dune.

  ``Show off,'' Lily hissed as she and I moved to follow.

  The Master did a quick survey of the surrounding with his far-view-scope. I noted it too: there were no undead around. We've always been taught to be wary when retrieving technology. The undying hang around technology, even the technology, or maybe even more so around the technology, that could repel or destroy them.

  ``Master, I hear something,'' Lily suddenly whis\-per\-ed urgently. She was staring fixed at the container.

  I listened hard and now heard it too. There were faint sounds coming from within the container.

  ``Young ones, watch my back,'' the Master murmured as he pulled out his weapon -- a blunderbuss loaded with force-light scatter-pellets, effective with widespread damage at close range, but hopelessly ineffective at distance. Lily and I pulled out our own weapons, Lily a sling loaded with force-light marbles, which can also be loaded with silver pellets, salt balls or incendiary explosives, or in a very tight spot even a rock, while I carried a light force-light crossbow, and just in case, I hooked a force-light short blade to the hook I had placed on the underside of the crossbow just for the purpose.

  Quietly, we crept up to the container. Lily and I stood further back from the doors then the Master very slowly unlocked it. Much quicker, he flicked the doors open, took several steps back and brought up his blunderbuss, all in one swift move. It took a moment, but we could finally see what was inside the container.

  Long before we could see though, we could smell the stench. There was old death and decay in the air.

  There were bodies inside, and the gore rose in my throat as I realised most had been eaten, chests ripped open and calves torn by hunger mad\-den\-ed teeth. I quickly turned away and choked back down my bile. I had seen pictures before, gore alone could no longer turn my stomach, but the smell combined with the sight was something I had never experienced up close before. I whirled back around again but took a further step back to try to get away from the quickly dissipating rank. It was never good to turn your back on the undead. Some could be unpredictably fast.

  Now I saw and heard something else. Someone was crying, muffled wracked sobs forced from a tortured throat. Someone was also eating, fleshy ripping, gnawing sounds. I breathed shallow and quick, by force of will keeping from embarrassing myself. I took another step back and startled when I bumped into Lily. I looked at her and took another step back, but this time from her.

  Her youthful face was dispassionate. There was a horrible emptiness in her eyes as she surveyed the scene. It was unbearable to look at, the still chubbiness of her cheeks in stark contrast to the hollow pits of her eyes.

  Slowly, she raised her arm. In her hand she held her sling. With deadly accuracy, she whirled her sling loaded with a firestorm round at the thing that had been a child, tearing into its own arm, crying even as it ate itself. The whole container lit up like it was Karta Day fireworks. The thing screamed but not for long -- firestorm rounds were designed to work very quickly.

  Stolen story; please report.

  Lily watched the whole thing without a single change in expression. I felt cold inside.

  The Master shut and rebolted the door when the firestorm had finished its work.

  ``Come away,'' he told us, and we moved away.

  Eventually, we found a bell, sitting in the sand along the beach. It was a big bell, larger than the one that rang from the only church on Karta. It was green and bronze coloured and the Master told us it looked like it was made of copper. A strange cable was attached to the bell, disappearing into the water and out to sea. A hammer of similar material had been tied to the top of the bell.

  We changed our clothes to something less Hun\-ter-like. Then I stared at the sand dunes that surrounded us. ``Master, wouldn't ringing the bell bring the undead?'' I murmured warily, my weapon in hand.

  ``Perhaps. Take to the tallest mound,'' the Master murmured. ``We do not know how long it will take them to respond. We'll make a defensive camp, but don't use the force-light walls, we don't want the colonists to be suspicious of us. Remember, they do not trust Hunters.''

  We set up camp, then the traps around the camp. Finally, the Master took the hammer and hit the bell soundly. I could feel it reverberate through my feet and up my spine, an odd trembling feeling, and was glad that we had set up defences.

  Night came, and still there was no sign of the colonists. The Master took the first and the last watch while Lily and I shared a watch, to keep each other awake as well as to cover more surveillance ground. She had finally recovered her former equilibrium with a nap, and told me stories about Hunters, teachers and other students that we knew of, some shocking, some amusing, some plain strange. She also knew some bizarre rumours about the Council members too. These she told in even lower tones of voice, just in case the Master was still awake.

  Finally, daylight came without incident. The Master woke us and murmured that he had spotted a boat coming towards the beach. By noon, the boat was finally being dragged onto the beach by five very cautious men watching us, two with weapons ready. We had very carefully hidden or disguised our smallest weapons about our persons, and buried the rest of our gear deep in the sands. We now watched the men, careful not to make any movement that would be misunderstood.

  The Master had briefed us that the colonists were a group that had left Karta very long ago, at the inception of the Hunter Council, when rules and laws were still being decided, agreements were still being tentatively formed, and they had fallen out with the newly created Hunter Council. However, they had a ship that the Master described as a carrier of containers. A container ship. On it could be boundless technology. Based on descriptions from the trader at Loong Han, the colonist shied away from technology, preferring to live simpler lives that included avoiding the undead-roamed land. As such, there could be a treasure-trove of undiscovered technology aboard the ship.

  As long as we didn't reveal the truth of ourselves.

  ``Who are you?'' one of the men called.

  ``A simple trader,'' Master replied, then gestured to Lily and I. ``These two are my children, learning the family trade.''

  It was a simple story. We had heard they could have technology to trade on one of our trips through Loong Han. And to tempt the colonists, we had brought something that they could not resist. Master now lifted a bag into the air. ``Soil,'' he called out. ``Soil, from far inland. You can look if you like.''

  He threw the bag to the man who had spoken. The man's eyes never left our group as he reached a gloved hand into the bag, pulled out a handful of the dirt, brought it to his nose, and smelled it. Then he paused, and looked down into his hand, repeated his smell test with a shocked expression. ``This is forested soil!'' he exclaimed in part horror and part fascination.

  Forests were far and few in between. For some reason, since the undead had taken over the mainland, instead of reclaiming the cities and towns, the forests had shrunk and then died, allowing deserts to expand. Some technologists reasoned that it was because the undead carried some sort of disease that infected not only the living humans, but forest vegetation. Others said it was purely because the animals had fled, and without animals, there could be no sustainable ecosystem. Either case, there were still some areas where forests thrived, but they were predominantly to the far north, in areas so humid that the undead rotted much faster or could not form properly.

  Some colonists had attempted to make their way up there, to the promise land, as it was known, but the journey was very difficult and few Hunters sent as escorts returned. Those who had brought home the soil as proof, but that and a husk of what was a living was all they brought back. None had ever returned with their minds intact, and always died of disease or infection beyond the skills of the healers within days.

  My heart now hurt to see the man fondling that precious soil.

  ``Is this all you have?'' the man demanded.

  ``Yes, all we have on us now. We can try to get more. But only if you have something worth the danger for trade.''

  The man nodded and indicated we should board the boat. At Master's indication, we followed behind him to the boat, but then he stopped by the man and waited. With a pained wince, the man reluctantly passed the bag of soil back to the Master.

  The boat trip took the rest of the afternoon. The sky had turned into whirls of blood orange and pink swaths by the time we could finally make out the ``container ship'' as more than a dark shadow in the distance. The sight was actually more discouraging than I hoped. It use to be blue with red trimmings. The name on the side of the ship said it use to be known as the {\it Deering}. There was rust in various places on the hull of the ship, and it sat in the water like a dead seal. Only much bigger. And much deader.

  As we approached even closer though, I finally could see the individual containers. What I had thought was just part of the structure of the ship were containers, stacked on top of one another like neat piles of books that were the exact same size, though differently coloured. I counted the highest stack as five and there were twelve along the side I could see, but I couldn't see how many fit along the width of the ship. They weren't all stacked symmetrically either, which made it difficult for me to calculate the possible number of containers. Nevertheless, there were more containers on that ship than I had ever believed existed in the world!

  ``You're going to catch flies,'' Master murmured to me, and I realised my jaw had fallen open and I had half risen out of my seat.

  By the time we finally docked beside the ship, night was falling and I was barely containing my excitement. On my first journey away from Karta, I might help discover the final secrets to force-light! Or perhaps even the weapon to finally put an end to the undead! The possibilities whirled in my head as I watched a rope ladder be thrown over the side of the ship, then waited patiently as the man who had first spoken to us, another man, and then the Master climb up the ladder. Finally, it was my turn and I scrambled up the ladder as fast as the long robes I wore would allow, eager to see the hosts of technology that awaited us.

  I was to be further denied, however. We were met onboard by an elderly man and his entourage of mostly women and children. The man who spoke to us exchanged some words with him in another language, then the old man smiled a gap-toothed smile at us and came forward, bowing slight\-ly to the Master.

  ``Ah, important traders. Welcome aboard the {\it Jannat},'' the old man creaked at us. ``I am Ammar, the nominated leader of my people.''

  The Master bowed deeply, and Lily and I, following his lead, also bowed. By the deepening wrinkles on the old man's face, he was pleased by this gesture of respect.

  ``Thank you for this welcome. We bring a gift,'' the Master murmured, remaining bowed, pulling out a small sachet out of the side pocket of his rucksack, and proffering it to the old man.

  One of the old man's entourage, a young girl about Lily's age, stepped forward at a look from the old man and retrieved the sachet. She gingerly looked inside the sachet and gasped. I hid a grin. Inside the little pouch was more of the rich soil \ldots and a plant happily growing. The girl whispered urgently to the old man, who waved her away irritably so that she retreated back into the entourage, receiving baleful looks from one of the older women.

  ``Your gift is most generous,'' the old man cackled. ``Please, come eat and rest with me and my family. We can begin our negotiations tomorrow.''

  It turned out that the old man's entourage was his family. The young girl was the newest and youngest of his seven wives. The Master had al\-rea\-dy warned us that we may see or hear things that are not our ways, and it was vital not to judge. I repeated this like a litany in my head now as I watched her serve her husband, the guests, then her older sister-wives and their children before she got to rest and eat.

  {\it Do not judge.}

  ``You named the ship `heaven','' the Master was conversing seemingly pleasantly with the old man, but he shot Lily and I a stealthy warning look. Lily seemed to be taking it well, however, better than I would have thought.

  Better than me.

  My deepest despair was not in the strange family structure though, as I looked around at the container, one of three in which the family dwelt. They had been furnished however sparingly as living quarters. From the gently probing questions the Master was asking and based on the responses, it seemed that most of the containers were used as living quarters. The top container of every stack was a freezer container, which allowed the containers below to be cooled through various holes punctured into the ceiling of the container, and through the floors for the lower containers. Thinking it through, I realised that the air must become more stagnant the lower one's home was in the stack.

  Their society seemed hierarchical, with the more prestigious families living higher in the stack. The old man's three living containers, for example, were each directly below a freezer container, and sat on higher stacks that any others, closer to heaven, as the old man described it.

  Again, none of this was the source of my great distressed, for I expected to meet different colonial societies with their own quirks. No, my most horror came from the fact that as I looked around and listened to the conversation between the old man and the Master, I saw no technology. No weapons, no force-light, nothing to match the wonderful things I had imagined we would find within the containers. I feared there would be nothing.

  Finally, it was time for sleep and we were given a prestigious area in the large container that served as the old man and his eldest wife's living quarters in which to lay our sleeping mats. For me, the morning and the faint glimmer of possibly useful technology could not come soon enough.

  But then it came too soon, and with loud clang\-ing noises loud enough to wake the dead. I jerked awake, my heart pounding, and reached for my short blade before realising it was hidden elsewhere. Lily, similarly, was on her feet but in a squat position, her sling, always hidden as a decorative wrist strap, already out, but she was still half asleep and hissing for a rock.

  ``Young ones!'' The Master's soft voice stilled us and we woke more fully to realise where we were. He was already awake, crouched by the curtains that had been set up to give us privacy, peering through a small rust hole in the container wall.

  ``What is it, Master?'' Lily hissed, then realised what she had called him and gasped, holding a hand to her mouth.

  He shook his head with a forgiving smile, then motioned us to come see. ``Some kind of celebration seems to be starting,'' he murmured as we peered through the hole. The sky was still the early shades of greys of dawn but we could still see people dressed colourfully running around carrying various items like tables, chairs, plates of food, long pieces of cloths and metal frames for something.

  A knock on the container from the other side of the curtain gave us our second start for the morning.

  ``Hello, are you awake?'' a soft voice asked from the other side.

  ``We are now,'' Lily murmured darkly as at a motion from the Master we returned back to our bedrolls and didn't need to try to look sleepy still.

  The Master then opened the curtain a little to reveal the slight face of our host's youngest wife. Her eyes were on the ground and she was half bowed the entire time as she apologised on behalf of her husband for the early morning noise, then explained that a wedding was under way and that her husband would greatly love to invite us to join him as his guests to watch the procession.

  The Master politely accepted the invite but requested a little time to refreshen ourselves. The young girl promised to bring some water, generated from the small desalination plant onboard. She also promised to bring some fresh fruit from their onboard greenhouses, for which they were all truly grateful that we had brought them some soil to replenish their existing old and tired soil.

  After she left, I voiced the curious thought that had occurred to me: ``Father,'' for this was what we were calling the Master while on the Jannat, ``this ship is very old, right? We had light in the containers last night but it wasn't force-light, and the desalination plant must need power. So how have they been powering everything?''

  ``Good question. Keep your eyes sharp and may\-be you can tell me at the end of the day.''

  Then the youngest wife returned and we fre\-shen\-ed up, ate a small quick meal, and followed her out of the family's main container, to where the old man, Ammar, was sitting, being fanned by a couple of his daughters. Or maybe they were his future wives, I couldn't decide. Ammar had not bothered introducing anyone besides his wives and eldest son, whom had been the man on the beach that had spoken to us.

  ``Ahh, you are lucky,'' the old man told the Master with a cackle as he saw us. ``Today is the marriage of the son of one of my oldest friends. A young lady from a poorer family will today rise up the social ranks. It is a great prestige for her family and for her. Many will now covet their favour.''

  Another chair was produced, clearly only for the Master, so we stood silently behind the Master as he sat. Where we stood we could see a stage had been set up, with a brightly decorated centre platform. Two chairs were on the stage beside the centre platform, but on the edge of the stage as far away from the centre platform as possible. Several sets of tables had been lined up, covered with bright cloths, and on it people were busily placing and arranging plates of food.

  ``Ah, here comes the groom and his family.''

  We turned to see a sedan chair, covered in more colourful curtains which hid the occupant. The sedan chair sat on two metal poles, which were held by four strong looking men, also colourfully attired. They hurried down the passageway that was hastily being decorated. As they rushed pass us, a sudden wind picked up one corner of the curtains and tossed it slightly open, showing me the passenger.

  To my surprise, the quick glimpse had shown me that the man inside was tied to the chair.

  I looked to Lily and she confirmed that she had seen the same thing by the startled look on her face. \textit{Shotgun wedding?} she mouthed to me. I shrugged in reply.

  It was a concept unfamiliar to Hunters, since we did not form such rigid attachments with anyone but our Hunter-halves. However, the town of Karta that had formed outside the walls of the Hunter fortress did celebrate marriages, and we had heard occasionally of forced marriages, particularly when a male had impregnated a female. More often, when the male could not be forced to marry the female, or the female to the male, the child ended up given to the Hunter Council, to be raised in privilege as a Hunter.

  The sedan chair was placed on the centre platform, but the curtains remained shut. There was more bustling, then suddenly, everyone cleared from the decorated passageway and loud, strange and haunting music filled the air. An elderly couple, richly dressed in silk brocades, came down the passageway and sat on the two chairs beside the centre platform. I guessed they were the highly influential parents of the groom.

  Eventually, we finally saw the bridal procession. She was dressed in rich vibrant colours and a hea\-vy, completely opaque veil covered her face. She could not see where she was walking and had to be slowly lead down the passageway by two also colourfully dressed women, though with plainer brocading on their clothes than the bride. They lead her via two red silk ropes. The ropes were joined together in a highly decorative bundle, vaguely made to look like a bunch of flow\-ers, which she held. Each of her attendants held the other end.

  It was almost a painful process watching her make her way to her future husband and his parents, but eventually, she was close enough to the stage and her attendants released the silk ropes, draping them around her feet as they passed her. She waited patiently as another man, dressed in white official-looking clothes, came to stand before her on the stage. He called out words in a language we did not understand but figured to be Ammar's native language, then looked to the elderly couple. They in turn stood and nodded, then sat back down. He called out something else, and the bride replied, her voice strong and free of nervousness or anxiety. Then he droned on further. When he stopped, it was so sudden I nearly missed it. He stepped behind the bride, who dropped the bundled silk ropes, then lifted her heavy veil, just as another attendant came out and set a small bowl of water and a ornate cloth on the stage before her.

  Her back was to us and I could not see how old she was. She bent and picked up the bowl and cloth, then stepped up onto the stage. She was cautious as she approached the sedan chair that had been set on the centre platform. She pulled a rope to one side, which slid the curtains open to reveal the silent groom.

  We could see the groom now, and it was clear the silence was from the gag that covered the groom's mouth. The groom was definitely tied up, bound around the arms, hands, forehead, legs and feet to the sedan chair which seemed to be specially built for the purpose.

  As Lily failed to hide her gasp, we could also clearly see that the groom was no longer one of the living.

  Its milky white eyes stared out at us with the inhuman senses the undying had for living flesh and blood. It had struggled against its bonds so much that undead flesh had rubbed off in patches from around its mouth, wrists and ankles, and stains showed against its clothes where the ropes held it to the chair.

  As we watched in horror, the bride approached the sedan chair. Once the undead groom ``saw'' her, it continued its struggles against its bonds more forcefully, surely hungering for her flesh. She knelt before it, brave beyond words, and began to wash its feet carefully.

  I found that I was gripping the back of the Master's chair as I watched all this. I couldn't stop watching, waiting for the moment the undead groom would break free of its bonds and tear its bride apart as it consumed her, but the bonds were well tied and strong, and she remained safe as she finally stepped away, drew the curtains once more, and handed the bowl of now soiled water and cloth to attendants waiting on the side. They promptly threw all bowl of water and stained cloth over the side of the ship.

  Finally I relaxed and released the back of the Master's chair, wriggling life back into my hands as more water and cloth was brought and the bride began washing her in-laws' feet.

  ``You seemed to have lost one of your children,'' Ammar said to the Master, and I turned to see this was true. Lily was no longer beside me but had taken several steps back, to the edge of the container we stood upon, her back to us.

  ``I'll go get her,'' I murmured.

  I just heard the Master say that Lily was probably overcome by the emotions of the ceremony as I left.

  ``You alright?'' I asked her as I came to stand beside her.

  She did not hear me though, staring down at the space between the containers and the side of the ship below, where a pen for pigs had been constructed.

  ``Look,'' she whispered, pointing down at the pen.

  I looked and saw that the pigs seemed quite content, rooting around in whatever scraps they had been given.

  ``You have to be careful, you'll make us look suspicious.''

  ``Look,'' she said again, more insistently.

  This time, I saw what she was trying to show me. There was something quite erratic about the movements of the pigs below. Then a space clear\-ed and I saw that their floor was littered with bones. Skulls, ribs, femurs -- these all lay scattered. Some still had flesh upon them. And they were all very recognisably human. Somehow, I knew that if we had been close enough to see, the eyes of the pigs would be milky and bloodshot. ``True death!'' I whispered, ``they feed their infected to their animals!'' The horror I felt did not quite make it into my flat voice, so stunned was I by the impossibly revelation.

  ``We have to get off this mad ship. If we don't, we may not make it to the next morning.''

  %======================================================================================================================

  \hr

  \mychptstart{When} we were next alone, after the guests were busy eating the food and drinking the desalinated water, we told the Master what we had seen. Despite being extremely hungry, for the fruit from the morning had not lasted, we had declined all the food. As it was, we were fearful of the food we had already consumed as guests onboard the ship.

  The Master listened to our anxious whispers a\-bout the mad wedding and the pig pen, then softly assuaged our fears. ``I had already noticed the pig pens on deck. Do not worry, young ones. From my enquiries, the food we have eaten has been safe. It is a privilege of the higher castes to eat uninfected meat. But, perhaps as a precaution, we should only partake of fruit and vegetables from now on. From what I can tell, the soil that fruit and vegetables are grown in are kept in very safe conditions, in sterile environments and enclosed greenhouses to the rear of the ship.''

  ``Why are they marrying people to their undead!'' Lily hissed.

  ``An interesting custom.'' Sometimes the Master could be infuriatingly calm and clinical. ``Apparently, they believe that only the unclean and non-believers can become infected. Therefore, against all evidence, any of their upper castes cannot become infected. They believe them to just be grave\-ly ill. If the young lady survives a year, her husband will be destroyed and she will inherit everything once her elderly in-laws have passed on. Then she and her family will move into the same caste. Even if she does not survive, and the odds may be against her as she is the third wife, her family has been permanently moved up two container levels. Ammar says he has great hopes for this woman though, for she has shown a great combination of resilience, intelligence and wisdom. She will take care of her in-laws well.''

  I caught what the Master had not mentioned. ``You said the upper castes cannot be infected by their logic. What about the lower castes?''

  He smiled drily. ``Ah, the lower castes. You remember the container we found on the beach. If any in a family become infected, the whole family are considered unclean and \ldots evicted.''

  ``They abandon the whole container, infected peo\-ple or not, on the beach?!'' Lily gasped.

  ``Oh, no, Lily,'' he replied softly. ``They throw the whole container, living and all, into the sea. Few containers make it all the way to the land apparently.''

  Lily rocked back on her heels, shocked into silence, which was a rarity.

  ``What do we do, Master? We can't stay long. This ship is a time bomb on a random timer.''

  ``Agreed. Living on a ship means that they are safe from the more incorporeal undead as they cannot form, but the way they treat their more physical undead seems like playing with fire in a straw hut. Unfortunately, on the days when the rare higher caste weddings occur, Ammar tells me no business can be done. We must wait at least another day. Now I must return to the festivities. Ammar seems highly pleased with me and wants to display me like a trophy. Just remember, young ones: do not judge.''

  We nodded as the Master left our small sleeping corner, and sat in contemplative silence for a moment. Then Lily spoke up. ``We still need to get off this ship as soon as possible. Tomorrow night, I don't care if we have to swim, I'll take my chances with whatever lives in the water, but I'm getting off this ship!''

  I chose to ignore her melodramatic words. ``We should help the Master get the best bargain possible so we don't have to come back,'' I murmured. ``We need to gather as much information as we can. The youngest wife -- I don't think she was ever introduced -- but she's about our age. Let's ask her about what she knows about what this ship use to carry. And remember what the Master said: do not judge!''

  Lily nodded and I stood, helping her up. Now that we had a purpose, she seemed much calmer and even a little more cheerful. By the time we returned back to the celebration, the groom had been hidden back out of sight, and the bride remained sitting on the centre platform on a litter of cushions. She didn't look as young as I had expected, especially considering the penchant to marry young wives that seems to be a custom onboard. She seemed accepting, nodding at congratulatory words thrown her way, but when she locked eyes with me, I saw that she was also determined. She was moving her family into a better position. And if she survived her in-laws, she would inherit it all. I had to admire her for her strength, despite thinking she was insane to do it.

  We found the youngest wife easily -- just look for Ammar, perpetually surrounded by his harem of wives and various hanger-ons -- and look to the edges of the entourage. She hovered there, awaiting commands from her elder sister-wives or husband like an overly eager pet. We approached and waited for her to notice us, which didn't take long as she seemed constantly on the lookout to be helpful.

  The music was still playing and she had to raise her voice to be heard. ``Yes?'' she asked, tilting her head to one side.

  ``We don't mean to interrupt, but could you help us with something?'' I began, leaning forward and almost shouting so she could hear me. She nodded enthusiastically. ``We were hoping for a tour of the ship. I know this is a bad time with the wedding and all \ldots'' and I left my sentence hanging.

  ``Of course. It would please me much to guide you around,'' she shouted back happily. She tapped the shoulder of a woman dressed in the white of a servant beside her, leaned close and murmured some words. The woman nodded, then she returned her attention back to us and indicated that we should move further away from the celebrations to a more quiet location. ``What would you like to see?''

  Lily's family had been farmers, so she took the lead on the questions.

  ``Our father mentioned there are greenhouses onboard. We are greatly curious about the plants that you grow on the ship and your methods of fertilisation. Could we please see it?''

  The youngest wife shook her head regretfully. ``The greenhouses are only accessible by the gar\-den\-ers. No one else is allowed inside.''

  ``Well, maybe you could tell us what you grow and how you go about sustaining them in such a salt rich environment?''

  ``The greenhouses are shipping containers attached to the desalination plant. Our plants are grown in a system based on the ancient agricultural technique of water culture. The desalinated water is run through all the roots of the plants and then further filtered to become our drinking water.'' Lily and I exchanged a glance. She had recited all this like it was something she had been told to memorise.

  ``You grow them in water? Why do you need soil so much then?'' Lily muttered almost to herself.

  ``We distil minerals and nutrients from the soil that the plants need. Very little soil can sustain many plants. For example, the amount your honoured father brought us may last us many generations! It is greatly appreciated as we have very nearly exhausted our supply.''

  ``Interesting,'' I murmured, and meant it. They had come up with a method of growing food in an environment that would not normally sustain it. I wondered if we could take this agricultural technique and teach colonists so that they could also live on ships, away from the undead on the land.

  Then I remembered the unholy matrimony and pigs in the pen and shuddered involuntarily. Maybe living too long on a ship without reconnecting with the land, even a dying hostile land, could make people go a bad kind of crazy.

  ``Wait, you said containers,'' Lily suddenly piped up. ``But your containers have thick metal walls. Doesn't the salt water corrode the metal and get through to the plants? And how do you get light to the plants?''

  She shook her head. ``These are special shipping containers made from a material that does not corrode in salt air. But it does mean we need to supply artificial lighting to the plants as any chan\-ges made to the original hull of the containers may affect their ability to resist rust.''

  {\it Ah-hah! Now we could get the answer we really wanted!} ``We noticed that you use no artificial lighting inside the containers you live in. What kind of artificial lighting do you use in the greenhouse then?'' I interjected.

  ``Light we mine for,'' the girl replied. We stared at her, not comprehending. ``We have a mine, to the far east. The lowest castes send men to work there. Working there for a year is all that is needed to move their family up one level.'' Then she shook her head regretfully. ``The survival rate is low, however. Sometimes the unclean get them. Sometimes they go mad. There is some worry that something has recently gone wrong. We waited in the cove, but no one came. Some men were sent to investigate. We are due to meet them in two days. Hopefully they have news, and better still, more light.''

  ``We see,'' I murmured slowly. I could not imagine it though. What form of light could be mined?

  ``We are about to bring up the anchor and move to the bay. Would you like to watch the anchor be raised and the ship be sent on its way?'' the girl asked us eagerly.

  Lily and I exchanged another glance. ``Sure, why not?'' I replied, shrugging. Maybe she'll tell us more about this mined light.

  She raced off suddenly, weaving between containers, leaving the wedding revellers behind, and we had to jog to keep up. Along the way, we saw other children were also heading in the same direction, toward the pointier end, the bow, of the ship. Finally, we came to the end of the containers, which was already lined with children, peering over the edge. She pushed others out of our way, calling loud orders to them, which were quickly obeyed. I guessed that she may be the lowest of her family, but as the wife of the leader of the ship, she still sat in the hierarchy above all the children of the ship.

  She pointed over the edge of the containers to the deck some three-stack of containers below. Some men, tied to a large turn-wheel, were pushing their respective levers, which was twisting a rope around the turn-wheel and pulling up something heavy from the side of the ship, probably the anchor. The men were not pushing with their hands though, but with their torsos. Some did not even have hands. Or arms. Or other pieces of their body. Then I realised they could not be men. My stomach twisted like the thick rope was twisting around the turn-wheel. They used their undead as labour as well!

  I shoulder blocked Lily as she began to back away from the sight below. When she looked at me, horror on her face, I mouthed: {\it Do not judge!} to her. She nodded, took a deep breath, and turned back to the gruesome scene below. Some of the things were actively losing body pieces as they pushed the heavy levers. Eventually, the anchor was raised and locked in place onto the side of the ship. Some men, living by their unfettered state and limber movement, used hooks on long poles to grab hold of the fallen pieces, and in one case, a totally decomposed undead, from afar. I imagined that these would now be fed to the pigs and whatever other animals are kept by the lower castes. The strange contortion of rope that was attached to the fallen undead was cleverly untied using the long hooks and another undead was pushed into the fallen undead's place and tied in place. Finally, an inwardly spiked metal cage was lowered over the undead things tied to the turn-wheel. The new undead was quite short.

  ``I thought you threw the container of a whole family with any infected into the sea?'' I murmured faintly.

  ``Yes, we do,'' the girl replied cheerfully, ``but only when we have enough labourers.''

  I realised at some point I had stopped pitying the young wife and now hated her cheerfulness in the face of all this unnatural madness. Hunters are taught to kill undead, but yet here they were, using them. This society was the exact opposite of our Hunter society. It was beyond insane.

  She pointed to the metal cage. ``There are other cages like that in the ship's hold. The man Hanna married today was dared by his friends to touch the cage without getting grabbed by any of the unclean. He was not fast enough. I don't know why some boys are so silly they have to do such dangerous things for fun,'' she muttered darkly.

  ``Can we go now?'' Lily murmured.

  ``There is more to see!'' the girl replied happily. The other children were already moving on, climbing down the rope ladders on the sides of the containers we stood upon. Obligingly, we followed the youngest wife down as well, and lined up against the side of the ship. Hidden oars had now been retracted along the side of the ship, huge metal-looking oars. Before long, we could hear a rhythmic beating of a lone drum from deep within the bowels of the ship, thrumming through the deck and up our feet. The oars began to move in time to the beating.

  ``Let me guess,'' Lily said drily, ``your {\it unclean} are doing the rowing too.''

  ``Yes. Animals are hung on harnesses above the unclean, and as the drum beats, the hooks are pulled by a team of men on either end of the ship from one end of the hold to the other, so that the unclean push against the oars in the right direction. Other men push down on the oars so that they are lifted out of the water at the right time. It is all very well timed and precise.''

  ``Of course.'' And there really wasn't any more we could say.

  Not long after, the rowing had begun in earnest and the children all lost interest. The youngest wife took us back to her family's containers and we sat on our bedrolls, waiting for the Master to return. We didn't really want to do much more sightseeing of the ship. We did constantly check that our weapons were easily within reach and immediately usable if necessary. To say we were feeling uneasy was an understatement.

  When the Master did not return by nightfall, Lily and I found ourselves climbing up onto the highest container we could find. The metal of the container hull was cold beneath us, but we felt safer, sitting on our bedrolls, back to back, and watching the festivities continue not far away below us. We could smell the food, and our stomachs made their hunger heard as well as felt, but by mutual silent agreement, we did not feel like eating, not even the fruit that the Master had vouchsafed.

  We could not sleep, even if there wasn't that incessant music that had long become beyond irritating. The moon was starting to set when the music stop and we could see people straggling back to their container-homes. A head suddenly appeared over the edge of the container we sat upon and I almost took it out with my short force-light blade, but stopped as I recognised the Master. He had ducked and now slowly peered over the top of the container again, a wry smile on his face.

  ``M-master, I'm so sorry!''

  ``It's alright, young one. I thought I would find the two of you up here.'' He threw his bedroll over the top and we shuffled to make him space as he pulled himself up. ``I told Ammar we had trouble sleeping last night without the wind on our faces, and he has graciously allowed this unconventional sleeping location.''

  ``Master, it's terrible,'' Lily whispered. We told him about the undead labour force, but it seemed he had already found out. Then we told him about the light mines and this was something new to him. He asked many questions for which we had few answers, then told us we had done well and that we will see what the morning brings. The Master took the watch then, and we found with his presence that we could finally sleep.

  %======================================================================================================================

  \hr

  \mychptstart{The} Master woke us the next morning and we realised he had not woken us for our watch. Sometimes I wondered if he needed to sleep at all.

  The ship was still in the water. There was no land in sight.

  ``Bring out your weapons. We're getting off the ship,'' the Master whispered softly.

  ``Master?'' Lily murmured sleepily, rubbing her eyes with one hand.

  ``We've stopped moving but the anchor didn't go down. Something is happening in the hold.''

  We heard it now. The distant muffled sounds of shouts.

  ``We're going to get to a boat and get away as fast as we can. I think the undead in the hold have somehow gotten free.''

  Now there was the sound of running feet. We could see groups of men hurrying the rope ladders on the sides of the containers and heading for the entrance to the hold. They were trying to be quiet, but the silence of their fear was in the air.

  We quickly packed, then waited for a chance and shimmied our way down to the deck level, to where the boats were held on the side of the ship by winches and ropes. We managed to get inside one of the boats, hiding under the weather covers of the boat and lying low as people ran past in a hurry.

  ``Wait for me here,'' the Master whispered when the sounds of running had faded.

  ``Where are you going, Master?'' Lily whispered back worriedly.

  ``I have to try to get some of the light they use in the greenhouses. It may be important. If you have to, leave without me. I will find a way to you, swim if I have to, just get away.''

  ``Master!'' Lily cried, but he was gone before her call was out.

  I quickly covered her mouth and we sat in silence, only the sound of our breathing echoing in the confines of the boat and its weather cover.

  There was more running groups, then the screaming started. I felt my heart beat jump higher as the screams came past us, and fade. We strained our ears, trying to listen for the sound of undead shuffling, people getting eaten, anything, but everything was too muffled to make out. Finally, I pulled together my courage and peeped out from under the weather cover. Lily did too, beside me.

  ``He's taking too long,'' she whispered.

  ``I know.'' I chewed on my thumb nail. Part of me wanted to leave, the thought of being trapped on the ship with undead a terrifying prospect without the Master's expertise in their destruction. It was not the Hunter way to be attached, I told myself, even if he was the Master. ``We can't leave without him,'' I finally whispered. ``We'll never make it back to Karta without him.'' I told myself that was the real reason, despite his assurances that he would find us, despite my training.

  ``On three,'' Lily whispered. I nodded and she began to softly count. On three, she suddenly stood up in the boat and threw off the weather cover to my horror. I thought on three we would be sneaking away from the boat!

  We were immediately spotted. We jumped out of the boat and took off running toward where we knew the desalination plant rested at the back of the ship, ignoring the shouts behind us. Surprisingly, we made it to what we guessed to be the greenhouses without being caught or even pursued.

  ``Where could he be?'' I wondered, looking at the rows of different looking containers before us.

  ``Master!'' Lily shouted.

  I shushed her but was drowned out by another noise -- a high pitched keening that went from audible sound to beyond, vibrating through our skulls and cutting our breath short.

  ``Is that \ldots?''

  ``Banshee,'' I answer in a whisper of horror. ``How could a banshee be onboard? It couldn't possibly form away from the land!''

  ``Young ones?'' the Master popped into sight, carrying something wrapped in plastic under one arm. His expression was startled. ``Run!'' he shouted as the banshee appeared behind him. And under the banshee was a child, carrying the big satchel of soil that we had brought onboard.

  We took off. We could hear someone running behind us and hoped it was the Master, but did not turn to check. I had never run so fast in my life! I had no time to dwell on the reasons for the presence of the banshee. We rounded a container and saw a group of men with weapons near the boats. When they saw us though, or maybe what was behind us, most dropped their weapons and ran away.

  One big man in particular, Ammar's eldest son, planted himself exactly in our way. I started when a small projectile flew past me and hit him in the eye. He screamed and fell to the ground. I didn't think, just jumped over him, and then leapt into the boat we had earlier been hiding in.

  ``Cut the ropes!'' I could hear the Master shouting as Lily also tumbled into the boat. I obeyed and just as the boat dropped like a rock, leaving my stomach behind, I saw that the Master had turned and was keeping the banshee back with his force-light staff.

  ``Master!'' Lily called, reaching a hand out, but it was too late. Then we hit the water and both fell back into the boat in a heap, the breath knocked out of us.

  ``What are you doing?!'' Lily screamed at me, throwing a fist at my head. She missed only because the boat was rocking.

  ``The Master said to cut the rope! I thought he was right behind us!''

  A sudden small splash beside the boat almost made me jump out of my skin. The Master swam up beside the boat and very unsteadily we tried to help him onboard.

  ``Row,'' he said the minute he could catch his breath. ``Row!''

  Lily and I took an oar each and began to row furiously. The Master took one too and alternated from one side of the boat to the other with better success than Lily and I.

  Other splashes were happening behind us, and we saw that other boats were being dropped. One overturned as it was too full of people, and rocked the others violently, toppling more people into the water.

  ``Row faster!'' the Master insisted.

  Later, I don't know whether it was youthful vigour and desperation that let us get away over sea\-son\-ed sailors or whether it was just because their boats were overfull, but we did get away. We rowed all morning to get there, but luckily we also happened to pick the direction that brought us to land.

  The Master explained to us that before we had interrupted, he had been trying to convince the little boy holding the sachet of soil to throw it over the side of the ship. The banshee had been the little boy's mother, who had grieved herself to an early grave when her husband had been taken away. Her husband had been sick, but from a lack of fresh vegetables, not because he was infected. However, the corrupt priest onboard had pronounced him unclean and they had taken him to work down in the hold as a rower, where he had truly become infected.

  To try to make his mother better, the little boy had sneaked down into the hold and freed the undead oarsmen, but by the time he returned back to his mother, she was already turning. She begged him to bring her to soil because she craved the smell of soil, and he had sneaked her into the greenhouses, unnoticed due to the commotion down in the hold. But then she had turned the rest of the way, forming into a banshee attached to the Master's sachet of soil that had been sitting in the greenhouses. She had taken control of the fragile little boy then, using him to bring the sachet of soil around so that she could feed on the terror of the people on the ship, trapped in the containers that were once their homes.

  The banshee had subsided after its feed and the Master had been talking the boy around, but then we had called and re-awoken the banshee. And the rest we knew.

  We stopped briefly on the land to gather what supplies we could, but stayed on the boat following the coast. Luckily, there was some food and water on the boat. They must have been preparing to row out to the mine. We didn't trust the food but the water was a life saver. After three days, we finally reached the bell we had originally used to contacted the container ship. We dug our belongings out of the sand and had our first meal in days. Then we finally began our trek back to Karta.

  Along our journey, there was nothing to do but search for signs of food and water or pursuit. To distract us from our hunger, we discussed what had happened with the Master. I asked the Master why that community lived like that, trying to co-exist with things that only want to consume you. The Master said it was a hope for another future. They hoped to live with their undead in peace. He could not find fault with their attempt, only with their methods. We argued long with him about even trying to find a stable living ground with the things, but Master did not change his opinion. In the end, we made it back to Karta before we could come to an agreement.

  When we returned, the Technologists eagerly dismantled the light that the Master had taken from the greenhouse. It had been a primitive form of what we know as force-light, but quickly eroded when exposed to too much sunlight. The Council sent a group of Hunters up the coast to seek out the mine. They found what might have been the mine, but it had been collapsed. And that was the end of our first foray into the Wilds.

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